


operation cupcake god

by billdenbrough (kunimi)



Category: IT (Movies - Muschietti), IT - Stephen King
Genre: Baking, Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, it’s just reddie and their daughter, mentions of ben and mike but they’re not in it, reddie with kids
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-14
Updated: 2020-01-14
Packaged: 2021-02-27 15:21:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,323
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22259407
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kunimi/pseuds/billdenbrough
Summary: “So, Operation Cupcake God is purely about Gab’s popularity, hmm?” Eddie asks, giving Richie a knowing expression.“There may have been some newly-discovered dreams of being her class’ Peak PTA Parent,” Richie admits.“I thought that might be the case,” Eddie says with a grin. “Why didn’t you ask Ben for help? Or Mike? Mike’s good at directions.”“I’m good at directions!” Richie protests.Eddie gives him a flat look./Richie decides to become the Peak PTA Parent of their daughter’s class via baked goods. It doesn’t go exactly to plan.
Relationships: Eddie Kaspbrak/Richie Tozier
Comments: 10
Kudos: 134
Collections: Losers Library Fic Collection





	operation cupcake god

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Lifesucksheres20bucks](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lifesucksheres20bucks/gifts).



> hi! this was a request on the loserslibrary tumblr (check us out!) from lifesucksheres20bucks which i filled. i’ve never really done domestic reddie, only one three sentence prompt fill on my main, so i wanted to give it a go. hope you like it, marika!
> 
> prompt: hello! Could i please request a domestic reddie fic! Anything with kids will make me very happy, thank you💜❤️

Richie’s resigned himself to a lot of things in his life.

Some which are still true—he’s never going to be able to fucking ice skate, giraffe human that he is, but he’s found a workaround in being very good at letting Eddie pull him across the ice—and some which aren’t—namely some thought-to-be hopeless yearnst for Eddie when he was sixteen which culminated in two very dramatic song-writing sessions, proven unnecessary five months later when Eddie captured his lips in a kiss at the quarry.

Still, one thing he hadn’t been expecting to resign himself to was his lack of future as a PTA Dad, and yet, here he is. 35 years old and seeing his brief dream of being the cupcake god of Ms Divega’s class turn to smoke before his very eyes. 

Literal smoke, that is. 

“Daddy,” Gab says, nose scrunched up, tone solemn, “they don’t smell good.”

His daughter is highly critical. Unfortunately, she’s also correct.

Richie reaches to open the oven, before pausing halfway, glancing at the smoke he can already see, and then back at Gab. There’s a teenage Eddie in the back of his head, lecturing him and Bev on all the different types of smoke, and how they’re all _bad_ for you, stop inhaling carcinogens, you fucking nerds—-okay, Richie can’t actually remember the entire lecture, just the way Eddie looked with his hand on his hip and brow furrowed, but he’s pretty sure that the takeaway of it is that he should probably move his daughter well out of range of any smoke that might escape when he opens the oven door.

“C’mon, Gabs,” Richie says, scooping her up in his arms. Her arms settle around his neck obligingly, and he’s overwhelmed with affection. There were legitimately days when Richie had thought he’d never have anything like this—when he thought it would be swallowing his feelings down forever, watching all his friends find something worth holding onto, staying on the sidelines because he couldn’t be brave when it counted. But look at him now: married to the love of his life, getting paid to make people laugh for a living, and baking health hazards with his daughter. He’s always had dreams he’s striven for, but none of his imagined happiness ever came close to how he feels now, burnt cupcakes and all.

He puts her down on the other end of the countertop from the oven, then hands her a tea towel. He leans in close, like he’s about to tell her something Top Secret, and she leans in eagerly. “If the oven explodes, just, like, fan it away,” he says conspiratorially. Her eyes widen, but she nods firmly, her face settling into a resolute expression. For someone with no biological relation to either of them, Richie thinks, it’s astounding how much she looks like Eddie when she does that.

He heads back to the oven and, with a quick exaggeratedly wide-eyed glance at Gab, he opens the door. Smoke immediately emerges, and Richie’s stuck fanning his hand in front of his face and coughing for a few moments until it dissipates enough for him to actually see. Grabbing a tea towel to cover his hand, he reaches in and pulls out the cupcake tray, dropping it on the stove top with a wince and slamming the oven shut.

“Mission success,” Richie says, giving Gab a thumbs up.

She surveys him and the cupcake tray dubiously. “They look _bad,_ ” she says bluntly.

“Okay, Operation Survive The Smoke was a success,” Richie relents. “Operation Cupcake God is still in progress.”

“Operation what?” Richie hears, and turns to face Eddie, who’s surveying the kitchen like he can’t decide if he should laugh or groan.

“Operation Cupcake God,” Gab repeats matter-of-factly. “Daddy’s going to take over the PTA like Darth Vader. ‘Cept I think he shouldn’t cut off Mrs Colby’s arm because she needs it to bake brownies and I _love_ her brownies.”

Richie throws Gab a betrayed look. “How am I meant to overthrow her PTA dictatorship if she can still bake brownies to tempt you with?” he asks her.

“Not by serving these, that’s for sure,” Eddie says, prodding one of the cupcakes with a chopstick—where did he even _get_ that?—and sporting the same dubious expression Gab was before. 

Gab clambers across the kitchen bench, peering at the carnage, and Richie swings her off, anchoring her to his hip. “Don’t get too close,” he warns, “the oven’s still hot.”

She throws him a very unimpressed look, and Eddie laughs. “He’s right, Gab,” Eddie says, pressing a kiss to her cheek. “It’d hurt.”

“Is it because we acciden’ly made a volcano?” Gab asks frankly, looking at the carnage with a curious expression. She leans over to poke one, forgoing Eddie’s chopstick and simply using her finger, and lets out a distressed huff when she touches it. “It’s _hard_.”

“Too bad this wasn’t for science fair,” Richie says. “She’s got a point about the volcano thing.”

Eddie laughs. “What’s Operation Cupcake God for anyway?” he asks. “Casual Thursday afternoon world domination strategies?”

“It’s the class party tomorrow,” Gab informs him, “and everyone _always_ wants to sit by El because her mom makes the _best_ brownies and I want them to sit by _me_.”

Eddie’s expression doesn’t lose its amused undercurrent, but it softens into fondness, and he reaches for her. She obligingly puts her arms around his neck and Richie hands her to Eddie. “I see how it is,” he says dramatically, “I’m the favourite until he’s home, huh?”

“Yep,” Gab says cheekily, before cackling with laughter when Richie squawks in outrage and proceeds to tickle her sides. Eddie, because he’s stronger and has more control of his limbs than Richie could ever hope to, keeps hold of her even through all her wriggling, though he takes mercy after a few more seconds and moves her out of reach of Richie’s hands.

“So, Operation Cupcake God is purely about Gab’s popularity, hmm?” Eddie asks, giving Richie a knowing expression.

“There may have been some newly-discovered dreams of being her class’ Peak PTA Parent,” Richie admits.

“I thought that might be the case,” Eddie says with a grin. “Why didn’t you ask Ben for help? Or Mike? Mike’s good at directions.”

“ _I’m_ good at directions!” Richie protests.

Eddie gives him a flat look.

“Well, I’m better than Bill,” he grumbles.

“Not exactly a winning argument, Rich,” Eddie says dryly.

“Ben’s got, like, an actual job,” Richie says. “And Mike—well, I probably should have called Mike, but like, I didn’t realise we could recreate Chernobyl with a cupcake recipe.”

“I’ve learned to never underestimate you two,” Eddie says, pressing a kiss to Gab’s nose, making her giggle.

“Hilarious,” Richie says, but he can’t help but give them a fond smile. God, he’s so fucking happy. He has been for _years_ now, but it still never fails to take his breath away.

“Yeah, Jason called, he’s giving me your next gig instead,” Eddie says.

“You joke, but he definitely thinks you’re funnier than me,” Richie grumbles, before brightening. “Though the idea of you on stage _is_ amazing.”

Eddie visibly shudders, and Gab gives him a concerned look. “Yeah, for _you_ , because you enjoy my suffering,” Eddie mutters. “I’d rather help you stage this PTA mutiny than _that_.” He notices Gab’s expression, and nudges her forehead gently with his own. “You and I are happy sticking in the garage, right? Daddy can have all the stage he wants.”

Gab giggles. “Yeah,” she allows, before adding, “‘cept when we’re dancing. We’re _way_ better at it than he is. I wanna be on stage then!”

Richie laughs. “Yeah, okay, rugrat, if I get the call for _Dancing With The Stars_ , I’ll send you in my place,” he tells her. “You’ll be half their height and still the best dancer there.”

“Will I get a trophy?” she asks seriously.

“Absolutely,” Richie says. “All of America will vote for you—well, actually, America and voting systems don’t really have a good track record, but I trust the public to make better decisions with pop culture than politics.”

Gab gives him a blank look, and Eddie stifles a chuckle.

“You’ll get a trophy,” Richie promises, “but first, your dad promised to help us with Operation Cupcake God—”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa,” Eddie says, “back it up—when did I agree to _that_?”

“You said you’d help with the mutiny!” Richie says brightly. “Didn’t he, Gabs?”

Gab nods. “You did,” she says clearly. “I heard you. PTA munity then we hang in the garage.”

“Mutiny,” Eddie corrects gently, then sighs. “All right, fine. Let’s clear all this up, then start again.”

“Why do we need to clean it up? It’s just gonna get messy again,” Richie points out, which he feels is a reasonable objection.

Eddie throws him an incredulous look. Richie’s pretty sure Gab has no idea why that’s the expression he’s choosing, but she mimics it anyway. Double trouble, those two.

“A lot of reasons, like it’s going to be harder to clean later if we leave some of this stuff too long, and hygiene reasons for clean workspaces, but mostly that we only have one cupcake tray,” Eddie says, delivering his final point like the closing remarks of some law drama. Which, Richie has to admit, is kind of apt, because it’s a pretty hard point to argue against.

“Yeah, okay,” Richie says, but he swoops down and kisses Eddie on the side of his head, and then Gab on her forehead.

“What was that for?” Eddie asks, but he’s smiling, and the look in his eyes is so soft that Richie thinks he could die of it.

“Just overwhelmed with love for you, Eds,” he says, and it sounds like a joke, but it’s not, it’s not, and it never has been. Eddie’s always been good at seeing the truth behind the laugh—except when it came to him, but they’re well past that now, thank fuck, and now Richie gets to tell Eddie he loves him every day and not only does Eddie know he means it, but he means it _back_ —and Richie’s glad for it every fucking day.

“Sap,” Eddie teases, but his expression is so fond that Richie thinks his chest might actually split from all the love welling up inside.

“Yeah, yeah, stop trying to distract us from the cleaning,” Richie says instead, ignoring Eddie’s huff of indignant laughter. “C’mon, put down the rugrat, she and I can tackle the volcano if you want to find an actual cupcake recipe that works.”

“You managed to cause this much chaos by following a _recipe_?” Eddie asks incredulously, but obliges.

“I mean, loosely,” Richie says with a shrug.

“This is what I meant about directions,” Eddie says, but he’s laughing. “Show me the recipe you had, I’ll see whether it looks useful.”

Richie nods his head towards his iPad—discarded on the couch in all the chaos—and turns to Gab. “You ready to scrub like our lives depend on it?” he asks, before adding in a stage-whisper that he’s perfectly aware Eddie can hear, “because they probably do.”

Gab starts giggling uncontrollably, and Richie turns his head to see Eddie pulling the finger at him. Richie’s face stretches into a grin even as he puts his hand over Gab’s eyes.

“Why, I _never!”_ Richie says in his best Southern Belle Voice. “The absolute _scandal_ of it—Gabs, I don’t know if you’ll ever be allowed to look at the world again. I’m simply _gobsmacked_ —and from a _gentleman_ , no less!”

Gab’s full-on _cackling_ now, and Eddie’s laughing too, and everything in Richie’s chest feels light. She laughs at his Voices just like Eddie did when they were kids—though Gab actually thinks they’re good. To be fair, they’ve improved a lot, and Eddie probably had a point when they were younger.

It takes them a few minutes after that, mostly because Eddie and Gab would finally stop laughing but then catch each other’s eyes and set each other off again, but they eventually get the kitchen cleaned and a suitable recipe identified. Fixing the cupcake tray is an absolute mission until Gab has the bright idea to pour boiling water on the charred mess—“Like when we have to get blu-tack out of Saffy’s hair in class,” Gab says sagely, to which Eddie looks absolutely horrified—and it makes the burnt cupcakes soggy enough that they can scoop them into the trash with a spoon.

Even making the cupcakes is a lot easier with Eddie. Richie thinks _everything_ is probably easier with Eddie, though he has to admit that following the recipe properly probably has some effect.

“Okay, sweetheart, what colour icing do you want to do?” Eddie asks.

Gab sticks her tongue out the side of her mouth as she thinks.

“She looks like you when she does that,” Eddie says quietly, and Richie starts.

“I didn’t know I did that,” he admits, and Eddie laughs.

“Only when you’re thinking really hard,” he says, then pushes onto his tiptoes to press a kiss against Richie’s lips. “It’s cute.”

“Cute, cute, cute!” Gab says, and Eddie looks at her in amusement.

“Where’d you hear that one, Gab?” he asks with a grin.

“Daddy says all your photos are cute, cute, cute,” Gab informs him.

Richie shrugs. “What can I say, Gabs? He’s always been so cute.”

“You’re cuter, though,” Eddie says to Gab, and she beams.

“Okay,” she agrees happily. “Can we do pink?”

And maybe Richie’s never going to be the Peak PTA Parent of Ms Divega’s class, or even just be allowed to bake anything without supervision ever again, but that’s okay. Watching Gab squeeze the piping bag too hard and Eddie lick his fingers of all the excess she got on him, Richie thinks he’s already got everything he needs right here.

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading! other than here and loserslibrary, you can find me at billdenbrough on tumblr


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